The Long Day of Revenge Read online

  “Now the rest.”

  Still silent in her challenge, she started to unbutton her blouse, one step at a time. Flinging it open, she exposed her bra and heaving breasts. The material matched her panties.

  “Naked,” the matador ordered.

  Lucinda flung the top to the floor and unhooked her bra, hurling it aside as well, so she was completely undressed before her tormentor. In spite of the punishment and humiliation she was enduring, her own breathing was becoming labored and the physical ruled over the psychological. Her nipples were erect.

  “Go into the corner,” he insisted. “Get moving.”

  As Lucinda paraded into the desolate edge of the room, Garza watched her go. He was thinking of a flood of things, and while his wife showed no emotion aside from rage, his mind was hosting a multitude of feelings. His eyes darted from the unclothed woman with the increasingly reddening ass and the green suit of lights, reminding him of both the present and what was to be his future.

  “This could be the very last time we do this,” he insisted as he sat unmoving on the bed. “This could be it, and I don’t mean in the same way you’re thinking. He’s waiting for me, you know. Gaditano is waiting beneath the moonlight in the corral right now. I swear he knows I’m coming for him. We are going to try to kill each other. Only one of us will succeed.”

  “It’s all insanity,” Lucinda growled from the corner. Her voice was muffled by the way she had positioned her head to face the wall. “This is just stupid shit you created in your own brain, about spankings bringing luck, but if you think it gives you some kind of edge and believe it so strongly, then more power to you. The only thing is, we’re never doing it again. I took your shit for too long, and the only thing I’ve ever gotten out of it is a raw ass. As for your giving this bull human qualities, you have to be dumber than he is.”

  Beside the suit of lights draped over the chair were other cases carrying his capes and swords. They were ready for Gaditano. Tomorrow he would bestow an entirely different punishment on a unique and far more deadly offender.

  “At least you must love me a little bit,” he mused. “Otherwise you never would have come.”

  “I want to see how this plays out,” was all Lucinda said. “That’s all.”

  It was then Manolo caught his wife’s hands moving to massage her ravaged rear.

  “That’s against the rules!” he shouted, leaping from the bed and rushing into the corner. “Get back over here!”

  His wife was really fighting him now, but luckily no one in the hotel heard. Perhaps everyone on his floor was out drinking in preparation for the big fiesta the next day? He didn’t know, and he didn’t care.

  “Get on the bed,” he demanded. “Lie on your stomach and put your hands on that pillow. In fact, you bite that pillow and don’t make any noise. So help me God, if you move an inch you will live to regret it.”

  The matador could see his wife’s body quivering with dread, but as usual, she went along with what he insisted upon. She had learned to be submissive in that way and now, on what could well be his last night on earth; she had come back for a final round. He loved her for that at least, though he loathed what she had become. The only thing in the world he hated more was Gaditano.

  Earlier, he had thrown his street clothes by the bathroom door and there, grasping his pants, he extracted the belt.

  “You haven’t had the belt in a long time,” he proclaimed. “Well, this is gonna be something for you to remember me by.”

  Folding the leather belt into a makeshift weapon, he went back to the bed and brought it down across Lucinda’s ass without warning, causing her to jerk like someone trying to swim where there was no water. Instead of screaming, as she so badly wanted to do, she bit the pillow, muffling her cry. There was only the ominous whap as flesh and leather collided.

  “You’ll never forget me,” he snarled and brought the belt down twice more. This time he struck in a new spot, hitting her upper legs with one blow apiece. Upon connection, she jerked and bolted as if by this movement she could cool the pain within.

  “Owwwwwwwwwwww,” Lucinda protested before taking another bite of the pillow and writhing as the torment extended throughout her entire body.

  Manolo, however, was lost in his own world.

  “I’m going to blister your ass. In the bullring tomorrow, you’ll be standing and not sitting! This is something to remember me by! You take this and never forget!”

  Another set of blows came, and Lucinda shook with each of them but refused to scream. She was biting the pillow with all her might, and tears were welling up in her eyes. These were caused not only by the ever-increasing pain being brought to her extremities, but the thought of how their lives had turned bad.

  “Take this!”

  Manolo continued to wallop away with the belt, mercilessly punishing his target.

  “Owwwww!”

  The pain was so great; Lucinda could no longer contain herself. The last group of blows set her ass on fire, and she moved back with both hands to shield herself while the tears flowed.

  “Owwwwwwww! Stop it now…”

  The spankings Manolo administered were real and often for offenses combined with the ritual to bring good luck in the ring. Thus, there was no safe word. He would quit when he decided to do so, determining when she had been disciplined enough.

  “I’ll tell you when you’ve had your fill,” he countered. “I’ll decide when you’ve taken all you can take. This is what you deserve.”

  Lucinda’s only response was an extended groan. Again, it was surprising no one heard.

  “You deserve every minute of this! You left me in my time of need! Then you come here on the evening before the most important day of my life! You act like you’re doing me a favor, and I’m your own husband! Who knows what you’ve been doing on your own! You deserve this!”

  “I know what you’ve been doing, you bastard,” she shouted. “Fuck you! I heard about the whores! I saw you!”

  This brought another series of licks against her legs and bottom, until they looked like someone had dumped a bucket of bright red paint upon her. The welts and marks were darkening now too, turning an ugly purple. Amid all this, Lucinda thrashed about, but would not rise or run. She accepted what was being done to her.

  “You take it!”

  It was as she looked over her shoulder, trying in vain to inspect her burning bottom half that she again gazed upon her husband. Once more, he was not even hard.

  “I hate you, Manolo,” she cursed. “I hate you! Leaving you was the best thing I ever did!”

  “Bite the pillow,” he ordered once more. “Bite that fucking pillow!”

  A final set of blows came against her naked backside, while she chewed at the pillow so hard she seemed to be eating it. With each strike, she tried to resist the onslaught, but with his free hand he held her down, while the belt whistled through the air, making terrible claps as it struck her body.

  At last he was finished. His own arm was tired and his breathing heavy from the effort he had extended. Stepping back, he looked down at his wife and relished what he had done. She was sobbing uncontrollably now, as she massaged her behind, still prone on the bed without a stitch of clothing. Her ass and upper legs were aglow, in direct contrast with the rest of her, and he knew she would have hideous bruises for a long time to come.

  In the past, he would sometimes place talcum on her or some other ointment, for what little relief these offered, but this time no such medication would be coming. She would suffer accordingly.

  Even more importantly, he would now have good luck. When facing Gaditano, he needed all the hope he could get.

  It was then the anger in him started to cool. He wanted to doff the robe, go down by his wife on the bed and make passionate love to her, but the inspiration was only there for a flash. Lucinda was having none of it.

  “Ear shit, you bastard!” she snaked out as she sat on the bed. The movement caused her to call out in even mor
e discomfort as her punished posterior met with the mattress.

  “After tomorrow, I never want to see you again!”

  “Suit yourself then,” he responded, turning his back to her. “You can show yourself out.”

  Had Manolo Garza noticed, he would have seen his wife slowly dress, putting on her clothing a piece at a time, while grimacing and moaning as the fabric brushed against her searing flesh. As the tears still flowed, she went silent except the rasping of her breath. She had nothing more to say.

  Manolo was looking at his suit of lights once more, and whatever longing he felt for Lucinda was replaced by his most dominant desire of all.

  “Death to Gaditano,” he mouthed beneath his breath.

  It was the final insult.

  “Fuck you!” Lucinda shouted and stormed out the door, though she was limping noticeably as she did. “Fuck you and goodbye!”

  When the door slammed, Manolo turned back and observed the emptiness of the room.

  “How did it ever come to this?” he asked the desolate quarters. It was meant as rhetorical. He knew the answers already. Still, with nothing better to do, he felt it wise to rehash them.

  Again, the suit of lights seemed to glint with a life within itself.

  “Soon,” he mumbled. “Soon.”

  It was then he noticed another extraordinary thing, though in her outrage Lucinda had pointed it out to him.

  He was not even hard.

  “Christ,” he lectured himself. “Has Gaditano taken that, too?”

  Falling back on the bed, he shut his eyes and as he did, the visions came. He was propelled back into time. It was now three years earlier in his mind and all was seemingly right with the world.

  How little had he known.

  Chapter Two

  Agua Prieta saw some shootouts in the Mexican Revolution, but since then not much had happened of great importance in this Arizona/Sonora border town. It did not even have a bullring, though occasional bullfights were held in a small rodeo area from time to time. In decades gone by, Chilolin had appeared there with Guillermo Capetillo in a much hyped event which saw things called off halfway through due to a torrential rain storm.

  It was not through seeing action in Agua Prieta that Manolo Garza caught the fever to become a bullfighter. He had done so after seeing bullfights on television. The only problem was with no bullring and no one to teach him, he trained on his own.

  In spite of learning by experience only, he had managed a few small appearances in the pueblos and this was where his reputation had started to grow. A bull breeder by the name of Eliseo Manzano out of Hermosillo had seen him and invited him to a tienta. There would be some managers, newspapermen and a couple matadors who already arrived on the scene there to coordinate or view the event. That was where he would hope to get a big break.

  In a tienta, the year old calves were tested for bravery by being let into a small arena, where they charged a heavily padded horse. The man in the saddle would issue a light jab with a pointed pole. If the calf turned and ran it would be considered cowardly and sold for beef. If he attacked the horse and rider in spite of the discomfort he would be considered brave and allowed to grow for three more years. Then, at the age of four, he would be sent to the bullring and fulfill his destiny.

  Manolo and Lucinda had been friends since they were little, but nothing had truly developed between them, though it seemed secretly both wished it to. Lucinda was not fond of the bullfights and hoped her potential lover would find a safer trade, even working as a wrestler in the local arena or a boxer instead. He, however, would not hear of it, and resigned to this, she gave him support. She also served as a bull when he practiced, charging the lure with a pair of mounted horns as he worked his way through varied passes.

  The owner of the rodeo ring allowed him to practice when nothing else was going on, though they came close to kicking him out one time when they caught him trying to cape a Brahma bull in the corral that was reserved for a rodeo. In intercepting him before he could pull off the stunt, he may have saved his life, for there were vast differences in the charge and the temperament of Brahmas as opposed to fighting bulls used in the ring. Rather than charge the cloth and try to use its horns, the Brahma surely would have kicked, jumped and trampled the aspiring matador to death.

  “This is what I plan to do tomorrow,” he announced in the midst of his workout. “Don Eliseo has guaranteed me a cow to fight once the animals are all tested.”

  “A cow?” Lucinda questioned.

  The cow is just as dangerous as a bull but never used in a bullring, so they just let people fight them on the ranches to train. You see, a bull charges the cape because of movement and not because of color. After so many minutes, it starts to wise up and will veer away from the cloth and into a man. That’s why the bulls are killed in the ring. You can’t use them over and over as they’d go right for the man’s body after some fifteen minutes or so. That’s why when the baby bulls are tested, they only see men on foot or an occasional flap of a cape as a distraction, but nothing more. If they did, they’d remember it down the road and kill a man in a heartbeat.”

  “I still wish they’d do like in Portugal and not kill the bulls in the ring here,” Lucinda complained as she paused to look at her would-be superstar. “I just don’t like it.”

  “Sometimes the bull doesn’t die in the ring, so he has a better chance than in a slaughterhouse. Haven’t you ever heard of an indulto?”

  “No!”

  Manolo adjusted the sword behind the muleta, the red flannel cloth used in the last act of the bullfight before the kill, where armed only with this, the matador faces his horned enemy alone.

  “A bull that charges well and gives a memorable showing will receive an indulto where they pardon him and let him go back to the ranch alive. There, he is used for breeding and lives out his days. It only happens rarely, but sometimes it does.”

  “So what do you plan to do with the cow?” Lucinda asked him.

  Manolo adjusted the cloth once more and motioned for her to charge. Snorting, she aimed the mounted horns at the red rag and attacked.

  “This!”

  As she went past him, Manolo dropped to his knees and spun on his kneecaps, turning so he faced his makeshift animal from the opposite side. Again, Lucinda charged and as the horns approached, the aspiring phenomenon whirled on his knees once more, enveloping himself in the lure while the horns sliced perilously close to him.

  “The molinete de rodillas,” he informed her. “I think it was Armillita who invented this pass.”

  His bull was running out of steam.

  “Okay, take a break,” he instructed. “I’ll just work on my own.”

  Taking several steps backward, he held the cloth aloft in his right hand and led an imaginary animal in circles. His form matched that of any legendary star from the past.

  “Just remember tomorrow you aren’t going to be fighting thin air,” she warned. “You be careful out there.”

  Manolo continued to practice with the muleta, watching his own shadow on the ground. In his mind he could hear the cheering of a thousand or more people, while the band played a song in his honor and fans chanted his name.

  Inspired by the audience he heard only in his mind, he again dropped to his knees and spun about, daring the fabricated beast to kill him.

  “Why don’t you practice with the big capote and make some passes with it as well?” Lucinda questioned. “Isn’t that what you’re going to be using?”

  “Only during the tienta part where they test the calves, and again, only to distract and position the baby bulls. With the cow, I plan to work just with the muleta. That’s what the managers and the important people will be looking for.

  Rising and straightening his back, he stood firm as he lifted the lure directly in front of him. Lucinda thought he looked like someone shaking crumbs out of a picnic blanket on a Sunday afternoon.

  “They call this the Pass of Death.”

 
“And why is that?”

  Manolo repeated the maneuver, this time with a bit more coordination.

  “Because at least four people I can think of were fatally gored while executing it. Gitanillo, Carnicerito, Granero, and someone else I can’t remember right now. Maybe even more…”

  Lucinda frowned.

  “Just don’t add your name to the list.”

  Again, Manolo did the Pass of Death and looked into the empty stands.

  “Someday the people will be calling out my name above all others. Someday I will be the greatest star the bullring has ever known. I will be another Granero.”

  “Didn’t you just say Granero got killed?” she responded.

  Manolo smiled.

  “Okay. Cordobes then. He lived and retired rich. Cordobes, Capetillo, Espartaco, Aparicio, and Viti. People don’t die from gorings so much anymore, because medical treatment is so far advanced. It’s not like the olden days.”

  Lucinda still frowned.

  “Remember Ciudad Obregon? Come on, Lucinda! I have fought live bulls and nothing’s happened yet. Nothing’s going to, either. Especially tomorrow.”

  Manolo furled the lure and posed, looking away from the snorting beast he was fighting within his brain and into the stands. He could hear the people chant his name.

  “Garza! Garza! Garza! Garza!”

  He stood defiant on the sand, flaunting himself before the horns.

  “All I ask tomorrow is for Manzano to give me a good animal. His bulls are the best in Mexico. You have Manzano bulls on the poster and the people come as much as when you have a top matador contracted.”

  Lucinda still did not seem impressed.

  “What’s with you now?” he asked.

  Lifting the horns, she indicated everything was fine and she was ready to go back to playing her role as a bull for him.

  “No, I can tell. What’s on your mind?”

  Lucinda looked not at him, but into him.

  “When you killed those bulls before, what did it feel like? Didn’t it bother you?”